Food, Fitness, Advice, and the Musings of Every Day Life

Menu

SCD Legal Stuffed Bell Peppers

A few months ago, I posted a stuffed bell peppers recipe that wasn’t SCD legal. Now that I’m on the SCD, I’d been wanting to modify that recipe. This afternoon, I did just that, and let me tell you, the stuffed bell peppers I made today taste 100 times better than my original recipe!

Ingredients:

12 red bell peppers

1 1/2 pounds lean ground turkey

1 large tomato, chopped

1 c. fresh cilantro, chopped

3 cloves fresh garlic, chopped

1 small red onion, chopped

3 c. Campbell’s tomato juice (in order for it to be SCD legal, the tomato juice you use can’t have tomato paste in it. It’s been reported that V8 has tomato paste, which is why I use Campbell’s brand.)

1/2 c. Monterey Jack Cheese, shredded

1/2 c. cheddar cheese, shredded

1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

1 tsp dried basil

1 tsp dried oregano

1 tsp dried Italian seasoning

Sea salt (I love pink Himalayan sea salt!)

Pepper

Preparation:

Just like my original recipe indicates, you’ll want to wash your bell peppers, cut the tops off, and remove the seeds and membranes. This time, I also kept the stems, instead of discarding them like last time. Place them in a pot of salted, boiling water. Boil for 7 minutes. When it’s time to remove them from heat and rinse them in a colander, the skins of your bell peppers should look shriveled up. This is what you want! Last time I made my stuffed bell peppers, the skins hadn’t wrinkled, yet, so the bell peppers were a little crunchy, even after being in the oven for so long.

Put your bell peppers aside to cool a bit and let’s move on to preparing the stuffing.

In a large nonstick pan, cook your ground turkey. Drain the fat in a bowl once the turkey has browned. Add a tablespoon of olive oil and saute your onions until they become translucent. Add the garlic, basil, oregano, Italian seasoning, tomatoes, cilantro, salt, and pepper. Add 2 cups of the tomato juice and stir your stuffing, so that it mixes well and the flavors distribute evenly.

Spray the bottom of a 13 x 9 Pyrex with cooking spray. Cover the entire bottom of the Pyrex with the remaining 1 cup of tomato juice. Grab each bell pepper, sprinkle the inside with sea salt, and stuff the bottom with a small amount of Jack and cheddar cheese. Add your stuffing so that it fills up half of your bell pepper, sprinkle with cheddar cheese, and fill the rest of your bell pepper up with more stuffing. Place your bell peppers on the tomato juice in the Pyrex.

Put your bell peppers inside a 350 degree heated oven with their lids on top. Cook for 25 minutes. After 25 minutes, remove your bell peppers, take off their stems, and sprinkle your bell peppers with a mix of Jack and cheddar cheese. Place the stems inside the Pyrex but not on the bell peppers. Cook for 8 minutes, until your cheese nicely melts and browns.

I threw one green bell pepper in there for aesthetic purposes but generally speaking, red bell peppers are so much sweeter than their green counterparts and add so much more juicy flavor. Although my modified stuffed bell peppers recipe today had way fewer ingredients than my original stuffed bell peppers recipe, it tasted a whole lot better! I felt having fewer ingredients helped bring out all the flavors more. Also, boiling the bell peppers longer in water helped soften them, which added to this dish’s flavor.

On a side note, the stuffing obviously is enough for more than 3 bell peppers but that’s all I had on hand. I would guess this recipe could easily fill a dozen bell peppers total.

These stuffed bell peppers are ooey, gooey, cheesy, and delicious! I will definitely be making them more often in the future. I hope you try your hands at them. If you do, be sure to let me know how they turn out.